


Along Came a Spider

by look_turtles



Category: due South
Genre: Due South Fic, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-04
Updated: 2012-06-04
Packaged: 2017-11-06 19:26:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/422355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/look_turtles/pseuds/look_turtles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Frannie has a favorite insect.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Along Came a Spider

Frannie was twelve years old when she had to write a report about spiders. Her teacher had said everyone was going to write a report on an insect and to keep things fair everyone was going to pull the name of an insect out of a hat.

Frannie stuck her hand in the hat and hoped for beautiful butterflies, instead the piece of paper had 'spider' written of it.

Frannie walked back to her desk and Steve Smith leaned across his desk.

'Whatcha you get?' he asked.

'Spiders. Yuck.'

'Cool. Wanna trade. I got ladybugs.'

Frannie couldn't understand why anyone would want spiders. They were gross. Just thinking about them made Frannie shudder. 'Why would you want spiders?'

'Spiders are awesome. Much better than stupid ladybugs. I'll give you the pudding cup in my lunch.'

Frannie thought about it. If Steve wanted spiders so much maybe they were more awesome than she thought.

Over the next few weeks Frannie read every book about spiders she could find at the library. Spiders were indeed awesome. She loved their thin, long legs and she had filled a notebook with drawings of their webs. Ma even knitted her a little brown spider to go with Frannie's report The best part was that she got an 'A' on her project.   
*************

Decades later, Frannie was in the kitchen washing dishes when she heard a shriek. She ran into the living room. Turnbull was standing on top of his favourite cardboard box, his eyes wide. Ante was barking.

'What is it? Did the evil rubber duck come back?' Frannie asked.

'It's... It's...' Turnbull stammered as he pointed at something.

Frannie moved closer and saw a small brown spider hanging from a thin silk thread hanging from the ceiling. Frannie was certain it was a daddy-long legs spider (Phoicidae). Frannie took off her yellow dish washing gloves and carfully grabbed the spider.

'Come here, Sweetie. I have a much better place for you.'

Still holding the spider, Frannie walked outside and put the spider in Ma's flower garden. She hoped the spider got all kinds of bugs to eat.

Frannie walked back into the house and Turnbull looked at her in awe. He walked up to Frannie and brushed their lips together. Kissing back she grabbed his shoulders. Part of her still wished she was kissing Fraser, but an even bigger part of her was glad she was kissing Turnbull. He was the sweetest man she had ever met. His blue and yellow Hawaiian shirt was soft under her fingers and he smelled like mint tea.

Turnbull broke the kiss. 'My hero.'

Frannie grinned. 'It was nothing.'

'That may be, but I still think you deserve a hero's dinner. I'm going to make your favorite lasagna if Ma will let me in her kitchen.'

'Lasagna with extra mushrooms?' Frannie asked because she loved mushrooms.

Turnbull kissed her cheek. 'Of course.'

As Turnbull walked to the kitchen Frannie thought if she was a hero she would probably be Zoe: Warrior Princess. Of course she would never wear leather because brown was a summer color and Frannie was a winter, obviously.

That night Frannie ate her fill of lasagna and after dinner she and Turnbull sat on the couch and watched a documentary about lemmings, Turnbull's favorite animal. Anti slept on Frannie and Turnbull's laps. As Frannie ran her fingers through his soft hair she thought lemmings might not be anything like spiders but if Turnbull liked them than she was going to like them too. Lemmings were kind of cute.   
***********

It was Frannie's birthday and she was sitting at the dinning room table. The dinning room was full of brightly colored balloons and Frannie was surrounded by her family and friends. After they sang Happy Birthday Turnbull walked out of the kitchen carrying a black cake covered with candles.

Frannie blew out the candles and looked down at her cake. Big eyes made of white frosting with black frosting pupils stared up at her. Frannie grinned as she cut the cake; when she told Turnbull she wanted a spider cake she had no idea he would make her one.

Maria's kids gave her a picture of the family made of macaroni, Turnbull's hat was made of bow tie macaroni. Eliane gave her a gift certificate to a spy and Frannie already had plans to have a girls night out for the two of them. Ma gave Frannie a yellow silk scarf.

She open a small wooden box from Fraser, Ray Kowalski and Dief. Inside was a silver charm bracelet. The were hand bag and shoe charms on it. There was one charm, a circle with a hole through it, that Frannie couldn't figure out.

'What's this,' she asked pointing at the charm.

'Oh, dear. Dief choose it. It is a doughnut apparently,' Fraser said.

Frannie remembered the last time she and Dief had shared a doughnut and how he had eaten the pieces she had thrown at him. As a girl, she had always wanted an adorable dog just like Dief.

Frannie bent down and wrapped her arms around Dief and buried her face in Dief's fur. 'Thank you. I love it.'

Dief barked. 

Frannie sat back up and finally came to Turnbull's gift. She tore off white paper with red maple leaves on it. She held up the book inside. she thought she had all the books on spiders, but she had never heard of The Wonderful World of Spiders written by someone named Ace Frobisher. When she looked inside the front cover she found our it was because it was a Canadian publication.

She also saw a message written in Turnbull's flowery script:

_To Francesca,  
I hope you enjoy this book._

_Love Constable Renfield Turnbull_

Frannie hadn't even read the book yet, but she already loved it. She already had plans for how she was going to show Turnbull how much she loved it and several of the plans involved his favorite cheese that Frannie thought smelled like Ray's old gym socks.

Later that night, Frannie read the book from cover to cover and sat it on her dresser next to the cowgirl hat Turnbull had also given her so it would be the first thing she would see when she woke up in the morning. And it was.  
***************

Frannie and Elaine were at the spa. After their full body massages they were sent to a mud bath. As Frannie slipped under the mud she let the sound soft music and the smell of vanilla candles swirl around her. She put slices of cucumber on her eyes. The feeling of mud all around her reminded Frannie of making mud pies when she was little.

'So, you and Turnbull, huh?' Eliane asked.

'Yeah, our relationship is still new, but I really like him.'

'Isn't he kind of weird though?'

Frannie thought about it. She had never thought of Turnbull as weird just different. 'No weirder than Fraser. Must be a Canadian thing.'

'As long as your happy I'm happy.'

Frannie sunk farther into the mud and grinned under her soy face mask. She had always thought Fraser would be the one to make her happy, but it was Turnbull and that was an unexpected and wonderful surprise.


End file.
